Paul Burstow

Paul Burstow is a social policy entrepreneur & thought leader. He chairs the Tavistock & Portman NHS Foundation Trust and is Professor of Health & Social Care at City University, London.

Between 1997 and 2015 he was Liberal Democrat MP for Sutton and Cheam. He served as the Minister of State for Care Services between 2010 and 2012. In the latter role he covered a wide range of social policy issues including mental health, adult social care, carers, personal health budgets, safeguarding vulnerable adults, end of life care and long term conditions.

Risk, Safety and Recovery argues that risk and safety are rightly major concerns in mental health care but that traditional clinical management methods of assessing risk have stood in the way of helping people to recover their lives.

Perinatal mental health problems carry a total cost to society of about £8.1 billion for each one-year cohort of births in the UK. But the NHS would need to spend just £337 million a year to bring perinatal mental health care up to the recommended level.